Decision-theoretic utility analysis applied to employee separations and acquisitions.

A decision-theor etic utility model that describes the consequences of employee movements out of and into the organization (separations and acquisitions) is presented. The model is developed for three types of employee movement: (a) repeated acquisitions without separations, (b) repeated unreplaced separations over time, and (c) repeated separations over time that are replaced with new employees. The latter model is the most general case, and provides an explicit link between separation utility and existing selection utility models. In addition to a conceptual and algebraic model development, a computer algorithm is developed and used to provide a numerical simulation. The results strongly suggest that decisions about employee separations can substantially affect the utility of human resources. Literature-based implications for future selection and turnover research are presented.